


the king in the white city

by thebriars



Category: The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types
Genre: Friends to Lovers, M/M, a tiny bit of elven telepathy because i can't control myself, mild misunderstandings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-11
Updated: 2019-09-11
Packaged: 2020-10-14 10:28:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20599250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thebriars/pseuds/thebriars
Summary: Three moments over the years, in which Legolas falls in love.~Estel. Strider.Aragorn.Legolas knew him, in some primal way, even though their paths had only crossed through the words of others and the rumors that spread down to Mirkwood, carried through the trees and the wind, whispered by the merchants and messengers that occasionally graced the dark halls of the wilderness. He knew of his conquests, of his speculated lineage, of his skill and his ferocity and his piercing black eyes.





	the king in the white city

**Author's Note:**

> the titles of the individual sections within this story are from poems by E. E. Cummings—'somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond’, ‘i carry your heart with me’, and ‘since feeling is first’, respectively.

** _one – the voice of your eyes_ **

** **

_“…only something in me understands the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses…” _

His eyes strayed to the quiet and imposing figure slouched in a chair across the balcony from his own, somehow glowing with regality and power despite his posture and the traces of battles long forgotten and ones still fresh in memory.

Estel. Strider. _Aragorn._

Legolas knew him, in some primal way, even though their paths had only crossed through the words of others and the rumors that spread down to Mirkwood, carried through the trees and the wind, whispered by the merchants and messengers that occasionally graced the dark halls of the wilderness. He knew of his conquests, of his speculated lineage, of his skill and his ferocity and his piercing black eyes.

Yes, he knew him. He had heard tell for decades, and once his father had confirmed that the grandest rumors of all were indeed true, the mysterious heir of Gondor had been a ghost in Legolas’s mind, slipping from his grasp every time he thought he might have a handle on who he was and where he might be found.

Legolas took care to flick his gaze over the others seated around the terrace, remembering the names he had been told upon his arrival in the realm. Boromir of Gondor; a pair of Dwarves whose beady eyes seemed to linger upon Legolas and his companion with contempt, a dark cloud of boiling emotion surrounding them; the Wizard Gandalf, and, perhaps most intriguingly, a Hobbit, who carried a curious mixture of the simple light that his people were said to bear and tendrils of a blackness so deep that Legolas felt himself began to lose himself in its void. Legolas, in all his years, had never encountered one of the light-hearted peoples of the west before and found himself wondering how anyone could be shorter than a Dwarf, and where in the world that despicable blackness was coming from.

But for all his attempts at distracting himself with the looks and doings of the various creatures seated beside him, he could not seem to push the Ranger from his mind.

He dragged his eyes away from him to which they constantly strayed, trying to restrain the urge to push into his mind and see what mysterious intentions lay behind his curiously restful expression, and instead glanced out over the city before them and down to the gorge behind.

Rivendell was wonderfully different to Mirkwood, and its soaring cliffside walls and plunging canyons and delicate arches invoked a sort of intimidated awe deep within Legolas. Something about its perpetual silence, despite the din of the waterfall and the voices that rung like bells through stone halls, made Legolas fall equally still, as if he were struck by a million memories preserved and etched into the city by his forefathers. The place ached with history, with destiny, with fate.

And so his mind returned to _him_.

Thranduil had told his son of the Man raised by the Elves of Rivendell, the one called Estel, who carried the burden of his given name and his true one all at once. Legolas wondered whether his Elven title rang as true as he wanted it to. He supposed they should all soon see whether the reputation that preceded him was possibly true.

Elrond came and sat in the great chair which they all circled, his sturdy features and simple brown robes imposing an automatic silence over the delegates.

His eyes seemed to pierce within them all, passing straight through Legolas’s chest and into his heart. He wondered what this ancient being saw within him—perhaps the warrior he liked to pretend to be. Perhaps the truth, which was that the idea that Mordor, his father’s sleeping foe, had awoken, inspired true fear within Legolas’s steely conscience. That he was not the one to lead this fight. That he was already infatuated with a Man he did not know. Legolas shivered and tried to push nothing but his feelings of tense anticipation into the forefront of his mind, despite knowing that Elrond was strong enough to break through whatever feeble blockades Legolas could construct and therefore certainly able to tell that he was configuring his emotions into a lie.

But Elrond said nothing of this, nor anything equally revealing about any of the others gathered before him. Instead, he lifted his regal head and clasped his hands before him. “Strangers from distant lands, friends of old…”

As Elrond’s steady voice rung out over them, Legolas found his eyes trailing back to Estel again, the tale of the threat they now faced somehow causing him to look to the others for guidance, for some show of shared concern. He found that he was not alone in this, for the soldier Boromir was darting his gaze about. Legolas had expected this, having sensed a sort of hostility wrapped tightly around the soldier.

What he had not expected was that he was being looked at, too. A dark stare, almost as piercing as that of an Elf, was aimed at him from across the balcony, and it ignited a flare of excitement along his spine, even as Elrond called forth the Ring itself.

_The Ring_.

He tensed, felt himself lean forward towards the beastly thing without consent. The air between the delegates tightened, as if everything was being sucked in towards the innocuous golden band. It was small compared to the stone table it now rested upon, but it seemed to command the group effortlessly. Legolas pulled himself back and looked around the balcony to gather what the others were thinking. Estel drew in a heavy breath and shifted in his seat. The younger Dwarf narrowed his eyes in an expression that might have been hatred and longing all in one. Most worryingly of all, Boromir rose from his seat and began a slow walk towards the object, his eyes glazed over with the reflection of gold—of power.

His fingers stretched, grimy and yearning, and Legolas felt the breath he had been holding catch in his throat.

And then the Wizard rose and a sound so awful that even Elrond was forced to turn away escaped his lips, echoing through the bright city and drawing overpowering darkness down upon them. Legolas could not help but close his eyes, the words his father had once whispered to him in caution now roaring through his mind in a tongue he had never wanted to hear, bringing a wave of nausea through him. He felt his Elven companions flinch away from the gaunt and weathered old fellow, who had turned from yet another odd partaker in their meeting to a being so clearly aware of what the Ring could do, a being so clearly afraid.

Even as the darkness receded and the rest of the council recovered from their shock, Legolas still felt ill in a way he hardly ever did. Elves did not mix well with such words, with such dark things.

He felt the eyes on him again.

But Boromir was not discouraged, and he rose again, proclaiming his naivety and ignorance with greater passion than before. Legolas felt the urge to notch an arrow and back him into his chair with its point so that he may be quiet, but that was no way for a representative of the Elves of Mirkwood to behave. And besides, Estel was wearing an expression of such outrage that Legolas doubted he would have to intervene.

“You cannot wield it!” he said, with a voice as rich as honey. A dozen sets of eyes flashed to him, and yet he did not seem to notice. “None of us can.”

Boromir turned.

“The One Ring answers to Sauron alone. It has no other master.”

Legolas watched the way Boromir’s fingers curled as if around the hilt of an imaginary sword from the corner of his eye. “And what,” he said with brittle annoyance, “would a _Ranger_ know of this matter?”

And Legolas could not be quiet.

“This is no mere Ranger.”

He held his stance as Boromir turned back towards him, eyebrows raised in incredulity.

“He is Aragorn, son of Arathorn,” he said, and the name flew from his tongue as if it were the only thing he was meant to say. “You owe him your allegiance.”

“Aragorn,” Boromir said, the tinge of laughter at the edge of his voice making Legolas bristle. “_This_ is Isildur’s heir?”

Legolas’s eyes narrowed. “And heir to the throne of Gondor.”

And then Aragorn himself spoke, at last, sounding tired, as if the weight of this truth had been crushing him for years. “_Haf-abad_, Legolas.”

And he could do nothing else.

Boromir spoke again, something biting and disgusted, but Legolas could only hear his own name, repeated again and again in his mind by Estel’s wonderful voice.

He drew his mind back to the task at hand, employing every last bit of Elven control to keep himself collected, to refrain from trying to reach out over the balcony to where Aragorn sat with a face of stone, but as the morning went on and he found himself brushing against the Ranger, standing as part of a doomed Fellowship, he felt the bony hands of fate begin to wrap its fingers around his heart.

** _two – keeping the stars apart_ **

** **

_“…and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart…”_

Legolas was wiping blood from between his fingers, back pressed against a cold stone wall. He had found a small hideaway in the mostly undisturbed upper floors of the Burg, and had taken what little water remained in his flask to scrub away at the smears of russet and crimson that now smattered his skin and clothing.

The silence was blissful, a sharp and welcome contrast to the hours of din that had preceded this quiet moment. Legolas’s ears still rang with the cacophony of battle—swords clashing and men screaming and arrows whistling by—and he envied his fellows who came bearing helmets. Perhaps then should he have been somewhat shielded from the horrible sounds of death.

He shook himself slightly, attacking his leather arm guards with renewed vigor, the rag torn from his already tattered cloak coming away pink.

Though the innate worry of where his friends might be and how they fared itched at the back of his mind, a sort of haze had overcome him and blocked all thoughts aside from the burning need to clean away the traces of this battle from his body. He could not truly rest until he felt like himself again, clean and collected and calm. He feared he could never be any of those again, but washing away the blood seemed like a good place to start.

Part of Legolas wished he had company to keep him from dozing off or the will to sing a tune from home, something to fill the deafening silence, but he had no energy to form words or even bring his eyes to meet another’s. Besides, those whose company he craved during such a time were off with things far more important than he.

Legolas found himself drifting to a strange place that only appears when one is exhausted and sore and numb but not oblivious to pain both of the body and mind, a place so foreign that he began to lose awareness of himself, pulled slowly but surely from reality by fantasy and fleeting memory.

He remembered the brush of a strong, calloused hand along his cheek, both heavy and gentle. He remembered the way his chest had filled with a bubbling emotion at the sight of his friend fighting his way through the monsters that besieged them, eyes dark and focused despite the panic Legolas could see in his face. He remembered the sound of his own name carried through the cold night air, tinged with worry that made him think that maybe, just maybe, he was not alone in his feelings.

But it was foolish to dream of such things during dire times.

Legolas found that his hand had stilled again and he attacked a particularly stubborn splotch of orc blood on the leather until he could feel his fingers begin to smart, red and angry, through the cloth.

He distracted himself by trying to assess the losses their armies had suffered. The death of Haldir had sent shockwaves through the Elves, their fearless leader cut down in the throes of the fight, and the Men were most certainly reeling from the destruction of their fortress. Gandalf’s arrival had bolstered morale, but for how long? How long could this victory sustain them? How long could anyone fool themselves into hope?

Legolas sighed, stopping with his scrubbing and tipping his head back against the wall. The room was barren but for a single rickety chair and the pale light of the morning streaming through a narrow window in the thick stone walls. It made Legolas long for the trees of his home, intricate and interconnected in a way that stone could never be. He recalled climbing up into the highest branches and looking out over the vast forest around him and out to the mountains in the distance and down to the earth, where his friends and comrades hurried around like ants below him, tiny and insignificant compared to the sheer size and scope of the world. It made Legolas feel small. It made him feel young.

He felt sleep begin to grab at him, catching in his bruises and cuts and ripped clothing and dragging him down into a familiar dark abyss. And he knew he should allow himself to be led down. Even though his need for rest was rare compared to the needs of Men and Dwarves, the days of tension culminating in the fight by the ravine and the defense of the fortress were enough to wear Legolas thin. For once, the thought of drifting off into nothingness and escaping his solitary suffering was tempting, and he relished the idea of letting time pass unnoticed and waking with a mind and body prepared for whatever arduous tasks awaited the remaining shreds of the Fellowship. The darkness would be welcome. It would be something he knew in a time where knowledge was scarce. Only now...

The Ring flashed through his mind. It shimmered, tempting and deceptively bright, and yet the claws it wrapped around Legolas’s heart were sharp and tinged in blood. He remembered their trek through Moria and the feeling of being crushed by an invisible hand. He remembered the primal fear that had flashed through him when he realized what the cavern below them held; when he had realized what Gandalf was going to do. He remembered it all, and it mixed with his old childhood nightmares into a hulking beast made more horrifying by the fact that it was real.

And now a new memory swung from the horns of the beasts. Aragorn, missing. Aragorn, fallen to a stony river below. Aragorn, lost to the sea of soldiers. Aragorn, injured. Aragorn, killed.

Legolas jolted awake, coming to his senses with a gasp. He realized that he had curled his fingers tight around the rag and had left crescents of red across his palm.

He needed to get a hold of himself.

He needed to find Aragorn.

But even his need to run his eyes and hands over his king to check for injuries and for hurts that lay deeper than the skin could not weigh out against the exhaustion that settled deep in Legolas’s bones. He wanted to curl up against the wall and sleep, but sleep would only bring terror, terror that he could only solve by finding Aragorn, something he could not do.

He longed for a warm bed and a night spent sipping ancient wine with his friends, both old and new, for days spent without dirt and blood caked under his nails and without the constant press of evil and fear weighing down upon his back. Legolas longed to find Aragorn now and wrap his arms around him and be held in return, as comfort, as peace, and as pleasure.

Legolas took the last dregs of his water and soaked a relatively clean patch of the rag, running it over his face to wash away the dust and to try and shock some sense into himself. War was no time for such dalliances—not for Elves, at least. War was mechanical, an intricate game best won by intelligence and strategy and patience. It did not allow for its pawns to intertwine themselves and breathe, even if only for a night.

But _oh _did Legolas wish to.

He remembered the way their eyes had lingered upon each other when Aragorn had arrived at Helm’s Deep, bloodied and haggard and oh so beautiful, even in the presence of Eowyn and the Evenstar. Despite the reminder of all that rested at Aragorn’s fingertips—Eowyn’s flaxen locks and the sword at her hip and Arwen’s glimmering eyes and the power flooding her veins—his eyes had fallen upon Legolas, igniting a familiar and yet foreign flame within him, flickering up and down his spine and warming his stomach and chest. Emotion had risen unbidden into his throat, leaving him choking on the words he wanted to say. _Le ab-dollen_, he had said. _You’re late_.

He cursed himself now for the exchange, and for the way he had felt himself begin to reach out unconsciously to comfort his friend and ease away the lines of worry on his face. The return of Aragorn from an apparent demise offered the perfect opportunity to say something intelligent and poetic and flirtatious and true, but as always, every last shred of the speeches and proclamations he invented as they walked together and in his sleep slipped away from him like fine sand between his fingers. But he could not have formed the words. They could not have rung through the halls of Helm’s Deep, they could not have reached Aragorn’s ears, without Legolas immediately wanting to swallow them back down again.

He could not have him. He belonged to Arwen, and should mortality be too great a foe for Arwen to conquer, he would go to Eowyn. And they were both far worthier than he. Their hands were clean where Legolas’s were stained in orc blood and calloused from the string of his bow. They stood regal and strong while Legolas nearly buckled from the weight of his own thoughts. Eowyn, too, gave Aragorn her soul, and yet she watched calmly as he pressed his fingers to the Evenstar and closed his eyes in reverence while Legolas turned away to hide the expression that crossed his face from his friend.

No, Legolas could not have him.

And in the meantime, he would clean the blood away. He would find a new cloak and smooth it over his shoulders. He would tend to his braids and brush his hair and restring his bow. He would polish his mask and don it gracefully and remain everything he was supposed to be: a friend, a fellow, in fealty.

** _three – a better fate_ **

_“…and kisses are a better fate than wisdom…” _

The crown fitted Aragorn. As Legolas looked upon him from his hideaway on a balcony above the palace gardens, he wondered if the crown had been there all along. It seemed so natural upon his regal brow, holding his wild black curls in place and weighing him down, keeping him in place, keeping him still.

Perhaps it did not belong there after all.

A selfish part of Legolas he didn’t want to admit existed wished that the war was not yet over, that he and Aragorn and Gimli still ran wild over the plains, bows and swords and axes at the ready. But he knew that those happy days of solitude with his friends as they chased a dream across the earth were over, only to live on in his memory. Gimli would return home and Aragorn would take up the mantle of Gondor and Legolas would do what he always did. He would search for a new passion, a new occupation, but he knew that the search would be in vain. Nothing could ever match the contentment in his heart that arose when he was with the Fellowship. Of course, the end of Sauron was nothing but good, and yet Legolas could not help but dread the endless years before him.

And Aragorn was to marry.

Legolas longed to curse Arwen for stealing away the only happiness he truly wanted, but he could not lay the blame upon her. She only wanted what any sane being would want and just happened to be the lucky one whose affections were returned. No, Legolas could not beshrew her. He could only fault himself, for he had not acted on his heart as he should have. As Aragorn had once told him, he too often followed his head instead of his soul, and Legolas recalled the words with a bitterness he loathed. How ironic that it should be the subject of his greatest regret that saw right through him.

Legolas sighed and ran a hand over his face, lingering there to feel for the healing would on his cheek. It had been from a beastly orc weapon and had not healed as quickly or cleanly as he had hoped, and a small part within him wanted it to stay as the red gash it now was, remaining there to mar his skin and serve as a reminder of his sin. For now he loved a betrothed man. He sought the affections of one bound to another, which was an atrocity of its own.

He looked down upon Aragorn again, some of the tension in his body dissipating as his eyes found his king. Aragorn sat alone, trailing his fingers through the clear waters of a fountain, and even from afar, Legolas could tell he was pondering something deep. He had promised to rest after their conquest was over, and yet it seemed that Aragorn was incapable of such things. He had already told Legolas of many a plan to aid his realm, which had fallen to the whim of a leader unable to see past the temptation of the power Sauron offered. Legolas admired his friend greatly for it, but his love for Aragorn made him far more concerned with the state of the man than his people.

He really was becoming quite selfish.

Legolas crossed his arms on the balcony railing and rested his chin atop them, allowing the exhaustion left over from their journey and extrapolated by his heartache overtake him. He let his eyes drift closed as the wind swung his decorative braids about. He was still dressed in the clothing he had worn to the coronation, though he had thrown the heavy over-cloak off and flung it on the bed in his quarters, and they felt too perfect and clean against his skin after the ages he’d spent in the same simple outfits. There was still the feast tonight, which was being prepared as they spoke, and the wedding was to come the next week, leaving Legolas and the rest of the Fellowship in Gondor for quite some time. Part of him itched to run back home and escape the epicenter of his hurt, but the idea of leaving Aragorn any sooner than he had to was a concept far more horrible than the burning ache of his heart and soul.

He focused on the world around him, the wind and the stone and the warm blue sky. He did not think of the man below him nor the way he surely looked, regal and poised in his crown and robes. Handsome. Beautiful.

“Legolas?”

Eyes springing open at the familiar voice, Legolas looked down into the gardens to see Aragorn peering up at him with concern. The crown glinted in the sunlight.

“What are you doing up there?”

Legolas swallowed and raised his head, shifting back in the chair he’d dragged out onto the balcony to appear at least slightly composed.

“Listening,” he said at last.

Aragorn tilted his head, always curious as to the interactions between Elf and nature. He had once told Legolas that as a boy in Rivendell, he had strained his ears for hours in an attempt to glean any information from the world around him. “What do they say, the flowers?”

Legolas smiled. This he could answer. “That they are at last at peace.”

Aragorn took this well and glanced around with a tenderness Legolas thought he recognized, swaying slightly in time with the flora about him. 

Legolas took a slight breath, allowing the feeling of Aragorn himself to wash over him in a way he did not usually dare. This was a form of communication rather too intimate for even the closest of friends, and yet Legolas could not read Aragorn from the outside in the restricted manner he tended to employ today. The crown had dropped a mask that Legolas was unfamiliar with over Aragorn’s emotions.

The wind carried Aragorn up to the balcony and Legolas watched him closely to ensure he did not notice how Legolas was pulling energy from him. A feeling of numbness washed over him, of such a conflict of feeling that the dominant emotion was impossible to discern. Legolas ached with the need to comfort his dear friend through this unnamed distress, but he only said: “That you are not.”

Aragorn looked up sharply. “How do you always know these things?”

“I simply know you,” Legolas said with a shrug. Aragorn’s face was as unreadable as his feelings, but Legolas sent him a pointed look and he sighed in defeat.

“I will come up in a moment.”

He disappeared into the body of the palace, heavy cloak billowing behind him as he moved, just as swift and steady as the light-footed Ranger he had been when Legolas met him. His background amongst the Elves and the Dúnedain would never leave him, much less the habits the Three Hunters had acquired over their journey. Legolas had found himself still scouting for orcs as he traveled to Gondor, though the beasts had been wiped from the earth by the vengeful survivors of the villages they terrorized, and he knew that Gimli and Aragorn were much the same.

He brushed his fingers over the wound on his face and lingered there, feeling the raised flesh and the tenderness around it. Gimli had joked that it was good for him—a knock to his vanity and a statement to the others in attendance. A wounded Elf was as much a contradiction as the friendship between Legolas and the Dwarf and it was sure to leave an impression. Legolas wanted anything _but _such things. His identity was enough for that.

If only he was making an impression on other things.

He heard the door to his rooms creak open, heard Aragorn’s light footsteps over the stone and embroidered rugs. His heart leapt into his throat and he willed himself to keep his gaze locked passively on the gardens, and not turned towards _him_.

A hand brushed his shoulder and flickers of lightning sprung from where Aragorn’s fingers touched. Legolas felt as though he were made of the thunderclouds that had sometimes gathered over the plains, dark and thick and crackling with power, unchecked and unchained and dangerous, and he wondered if Aragorn felt the electricity thrashing just beneath his skin, rearing up as it always did in the King’s presence. Surely he must, for it was too strong to be hidden for long, even by an Elf.

Aragorn said nothing, nor jumped away from Legolas as if he had been shocked. He simply passed by and leaned heavily in the corner of the railing, head tilting back as though he were anchored by the silver crown upon his brow. Legolas watched him curiously, stretching his fingers out slowly towards his friend in an attempt to read as much of him as he could.

“What troubles you, my King?” Aragorn was too well versed with the Elves, it seemed, for though Legolas received endless waves of dark feelings, he could see no more. It was as though a shield of fog was raised within Aragorn’s mind, surely something he had developed to ward off the probing of his childhood fellows.

Aragorn’s head righted instantly, eyes narrowed and piercing. “Do not call me that,” he snapped, and Legolas jerked away, curling his fingers back to dig into his palms. He felt as though he had been drowned in anger for a moment, and it left a chill deep within his chest. The ice in Aragorn’s eyes fell away in a second, widening in shock at himself. “Legolas, I’m sorry, I did not mean to—”

“There is no need to apologize, _Aragorn_,” he corrected, letting the tiniest of smiles quirk in the corner of his mouth. “I know you did not.”

A sigh, and Aragorn ran his hands over his face. His shoulders fell forward as though he were suddenly pulled down to the earth by the Ring itself. “No, truly, my friend; I do not know what came over me.”

“There is much that weighs upon you now, more than ever before,” Legolas began, cautious. “Even though it is destroyed and we are victors in this horrible war.” He carefully reached out again, letting the new waves of remorse wash over him. Aragorn’s steely eyes were fixed only on his face, and he did not notice as Legolas extended his mind to his and slowly but surely filled his head with comfort. Legolas clenched his jaw and pushed as much love as he could to Aragorn, a part of him beginning to feel giddy from his newfound confidence. He had never reached out so blatantly to Aragorn, even in their darkest moments. He had brushed over every member of the Fellowship before, of course, trying to gather their emotions and intentions, but he had never dared to give anything in return. But now…

“I suppose so,” Aragorn said, exhaustion spreading his strong voice as thin as the lives of Men. Legolas sat in anticipation, trying to focus on what Aragorn said as much as what he was attempting to do. “I did not truly expect to win, and here we are, and I am… unsure of how to proceed.”

“The crown ties you here,” Legolas ventured. “It is entirely different than the other allegiances you have worn throughout your life.” The fog broke ever so slightly, and Legolas let himself reach forward and peek through. The words fell off his tongue like water droplets from leaves after a rainstorm. “You do not know this place yet, and you do not know if they will obey you, much less trust you. You do not want to give it all up yet. You do not wish to stay chained to this city forever. You do not wish to marry—”

Legolas clasped a hand over his mouth, cutting himself short. Had his own dreams slipped through his mind and out from between his lips? Or had he truly read Aragorn correctly?

Aragorn was watching him with an unreadable expression, his arms folded loosely over his chest. “You are in my mind.”

Like a pond in the depths of winter, Legolas went cold and stiff. “Only to comfort.”

A tilt of Aragorn’s head, as though he were amused by the answer. “You think I do not know what it feels like to have an Elf in your head?”

Swallowing hard around the lump of fear now lodged in Legolas’s throat, he pulled back with haste, back and back and back until he could hardly feel himself. “I have never—"

“I felt you when we first joined the others. And when I returned from my fall, and during every battle.”

The air seemed to fall still, too, and Legolas hardly dared breathe for fear that he would say something more, something he would regret. He had never felt more like a Man.

Aragorn’s familiar crooked smile flashed over his face. “You have been lingering.”

“Aragorn, truly, I did not—”

“Legolas.” His voice, so calm and assured, was enough to stop Legolas in his tracks. “I am not complaining.”

And as Aragorn took a step forward, a hand reaching out towards Legolas as if he stood in a dream, Legolas felt the wall begin to crumble away, even though he had pulled so far back into himself that he could hardly tell what Aragorn’s voice was saying beneath his words. It felt as though he had halted time for a moment, shock still while the world moved slowly around him as if underwater, and Aragorn’s fingers brushed his cheek.

The electricity that had lied in waiting around them reared at the contact and Legolas felt his breath slip from his lungs.

“And you are right. I fear this crown—this marriage—will keep me from experiencing the life I came to wish for during our journey.”

Legolas watched his face with frozen awe, digging his hands into his things to keep from reaching up to cup Aragorn’s face in a mirror of the king’s own movements. A tenderness lay there in the creases between his brows and in the way his lips quirked upwards in a sad smile.

“For I used to dream of little but Gondor, little but this.” His eyes darted away to flick out over the city, which glimmered in the sun as though the stone was embedded with diamonds. “My heart and hope rested on a vision of grandeur and righteous rule, until that meeting upon the balcony. Until I saw _you_.”

“But—”

“Yes, I had heard of you,” Aragorn continued, a gentle graze of his thumb against the corner of Legolas’s mouth cutting all thoughts of protest short. “A beautiful Elven prince, as deadly as he was lovely. One who carried a longbow and who rose above the rest, agelessly young, with a dark eye and a sharp tongue.”

“Estel, truly—” Legolas started, falling back to Aragorn’s Elven name, as if it might remind him of his betrothed, who was willing to give up _everything_ for him, who had uttered that name so delicately, so darkly, when they reunited at the coronation, as if it were a prayer and a curse all in one—

He winced. “_Aragorn_. Always I am Aragorn to you.”

Legolas could not help himself and reached up to press his own hand against the one that lay on his cheek, feeling its warmth and strength and remembering how it had rested upon his shoulder after the perceived demise of Gandalf, how it had held his sword aloft amidst a bloodbath, how it had cradled Arwen’s with tenderness hitherto unheard of among Men.

He jumped up.

“Aragorn, friend, you cannot—_we_ cannot—”

Aragorn stood, facing him, hand lingering against the ghost of Legolas’s cheek. “Legolas.”

“She has given up her eternal flame for you, you have carried the _Evenstar_, and I cannot step between that.” He had half a mind to simply fall over the railing and trust his instincts to catch himself, but he could do little but ramble in a way that felt uncharacteristic, even to himself, choking on the words that had clogged his mind for years, and even the way that Aragorn was stepping towards him again and moving his mouth and saying words that would normally cease all other thoughts in Legolas’s mind was not enough to shake him from his state of alarm.

“_Legolas_,” Aragorn said at last, with a sharpness that cut through the rising tension like the edge of his blade. “Legolas, she knows. We are little but partners in a game of trivial advancements, playing to each other’s advancements.” He approached again, slow steps, as though he were approaching a skittish fawn, shivering and alone in the forest. Legolas let him, blinking in the sunlight that glanced off the peaks of his crown. Aragorn continued.

“Her true love was killed in battle many years ago, and she wishes to join him in the afterlife. So she will stay with me as a friend until our time runs out and I am glad for her company and the gift of the Evenstar, but I am not afraid of her thoughts and feelings when it comes to the greater expanses of my heart. I was only afraid of _this_; that my betrothal might sully the clarity of our relations.”

His hand came up again, resting tentatively on Legolas’s shoulder. “I hope you can forgive me, my friend. I did not think.”

“I could never remain upset with you,” Legolas said, his voice falling into the wind, softer than he intended it to be. The words that had once clambered to fall from his lips disintegrated into nothingness, and the hand that weighed down upon him became the only thing he could sense besides the way that Aragorn was looking at him.

And with a final sigh of the wind, the wall within him crumbled away and Legolas was overwhelmed with an outpouring of emotion, more than he could have ever dreamed of accessing without Aragorn’s aid.

He saw himself at Elrond’s Council, treading lightly over the snow on the path through the mountains, crouched at the edge of a babbling stream, drawing back his bow against Éomer with fury woven through his movements, coming down the stairs from the Burg with a missed smear of blood under his jaw, standing aglow on the plateau of Minas Tirith, looking down on him from the balcony over the gardens with unmistakable wistfulness…

Legolas inhaled sharply, eyes wide as Aragorn’s steady gaze bore through his mind, unearthing the memories that Legolas pushed to the front. Aragorn at the council, Aragorn warming his hands by the fire, Aragorn falling to his knees at the site of the burning orcs, Aragorn striding into Helm’s Deep. Aragorn leading their forces to the Black Gate, Aragorn’s face flashing with desperation as they fell back from the gate, Aragorn in royal attire, head held high.

_Aragorn_.

And lips met his, careful and tender and soft.

**Author's Note:**

> this is my first LOTR story, even though i’ve been a lurking fandom member since i was, like, twelve. i hope you enjoyed! 
> 
> i didn't intend for it to be as much of a focus on elven telepathy and all that jazz, but it happened and i didn't hate it, so it got to stick around XD. let me know what you thought! also, come scream about aralas with me on [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/thebriars)!


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